Letter writers traded in their pens for microphone

March 25, 1990|By Mark Andrews Of The Sentinel Staff

Through song, rhyme and the plainly spoken word, some of The Orlando Sentinel's best letter writers and guest columnists displayed wit, petulance and style when they traded in their pens last week for a microphone.

Kids and guns, the arts, pornography and censorship, schools and roads.

They were among the topics that motivated these opinionated and articulate people as they took the floor at the 11th Letter Writers' Forum Thursday night.

Invited were Sentinel readers who during 1989 submitted what editors judged outstanding letters to the editor - those marked with a star - and the authors of ''My Word'' columns, which appear on this page several days a week.

More than 200 writers attended the dinner at the Radisson Plaza Hotel in Orlando, along with a few dozen public officials and Sentinel staff members.

The newspaper receives about 400 letters to the editor each week, not including those submitted for the ''Saturday special,'' county Sentinels and Florida magazine. About one out of every seven is accepted for publication.

Associate editor Jane Healy presented Jack Levine a plaque to recognize his being named the Sentinel's ''Floridian of the Year'' for 1989 for his work on behalf of children. Levine is executive director of the Florida Center for Children and Youth in Tallahassee.

Healy also recognized letters editor Bill Summers, who will retire at the end of this week after 35 years at the newspaper - the last 19 of which he spent culling through an estimated 395,000 letters.

Before letter writers took their turns at the mike, Orlando Mayor Bill Frederick and Sentinel columnist Bob Morris debated the question, ''Does the sun still rise on Florida?''

Morris insisted that a better question for the evening would have been ''Why the heck did the Sentinel schedule this event on the same night as an Orlando Magic game and the NCAA playoffs?''

Taking his customary contrarian point of view, he said that Florida is hanging midway between heaven and hell because of its sins of overdevelopment, poor schools and sucking the water table nearly dry.

Ever the civic booster, Frederick said the notion of a Florida entering its twilight years was ''obviously nonsense.''

''The simple fact is, until the invention of air conditioning and bug spray, Florida was a pretty miserable place to be,'' said the mayor. In fact, before the 1960s, many Floridians had a Third World standard of living, he added.

When it was the writers' turn to speak, guns and/or children were on the minds of several.

For Leola Sweeney of Deltona, the two subjects came together in the form of an annual state-sponsored deer hunt for youngsters between the ages of 8 and 15, which she said should be banned.

''Children who are not mature enough to drive cars or to vote are also not mature enough to handle guns,'' she said. ''If children want to learn to hunt, they can do it on their own time and money, not the state's.''

Jim Schlienz of DeBary said he did not advocate a ban on all guns, but wants ''some sensible controls.''

Clare Sheaffer of St. Cloud pleaded for community support for a teen center, which a non-profit group is trying to build in Osceola County.

Society often has more regard for mistreated animals than for children, said Nikki Raub of Altamonte Springs, whose 9-year-old daughter Jessica wrote a star letter last year.

Censorship issues raised the hackles of other speakers.

Kendra Muselle of Winter Park complained that ''there are those in our community who believe they are best-suited to decide for me what I can read, view or say.''

Marti Mackenzie-Walker took law enforcement officials to task for what she called their ''preoccupation with pornography.''

Growth and the environment are often favorite subjects of letter writers and some of them brought those concerns to the forum.

''We just keep on building shopping centers, even those built lack half their renters,'' Donald Salvetti of Apopka lamented, singing to the tune of ''Bye-bye, Blackbird.'' ''So, let's wake up and see the light before it's 'bye-bye, sunland,' '' he sang.

Alan Nordstrom of Winter Park pleaded for protection of the ozone layer and for more bicycle paths, while Marie Pilla of Orlando asked the audience to promote an end to the ''needless slaughter of wildlife.''

Eleanor Redding of Melbourne Beach wants land along the route of the defunct Cross-Florida Barge Canal to be preserved for a greenbelt that would stretch from the Atlantic Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico.

''Don't let it be sold off. Use it for the good of the whole state,'' she pleaded.

Irene Thibodeau of Orlando asked Orange County Commissioner Vera Carter when Conway Road would be widened.